El Paso is getting ready to put salty leftovers on the menu for local taps.
El Paso Water’s Public Service Board voted this week to move forward with a plan that would send briny concentrate from the city’s desalination plant to a private company, Upwell Water Critical Material Corporation. The company would treat the salty waste, strip out saleable minerals, and return treated drinking water to the utility. Officials say the partnership could yield about 3 million gallons of potable water a day while cutting down on waste, a pitch they are framing as a first-of-its-kind way to squeeze more supply from existing infrastructure.
According to KFOX14/CBS4, the board approved the agreement at its Wednesday meeting and described the project as “first-of-its-kind.” The station reports the effort could recover up to 3 million gallons per day, or about 1.1 billion gallons annually, and that the item was shifted into executive session for legal discussion before members cast their votes. KFOX also noted that officials have not yet said how the plan could affect customer bills or when the private facility might start operating.
How the Upwell partnership would work
El Paso’s Kay Bailey Hutchison (KBH) desalination plant treats brackish groundwater and currently disposes of the concentrated brine through deep-well injection, according to El Paso Water. The utility states that the KBH plant produces about 27.5 million gallons per day and that reclaiming water and minerals from the concentrate could effectively boost local supply.
A 2021 brine treatment agreement on file with the utility spells out how a private operator would process the concentrate, return water to El Paso Water, and receive payment based on the volume delivered. The contract schedule lists an initial payment rate of 2.75 dollars per 1,000 gallons in the first contract year.
Backstory and local context
The site next to the KBH plant has been on the radar of private companies for years as El Paso looks for ways to stretch limited surface water and aquifer resources. Reporting by El Paso Matters detailed earlier plans to refurbish the neighboring facility and estimated roughly 100 million dollars in investment to bring mineral-recovery and treatment operations online. That coverage also described prior proposals in which a private operator would accept brine at no cost and then sell the treated water back to the utility under a purchase agreement.
Questions remain
Even with the board’s sign-off, a lot of blanks still need to be filled in. KFOX reported that the utility did not provide a construction or startup timeline and said it remains unclear how much, if anything, customers will ultimately pay for the reclaimed water. Before any of that treated brine flows back into the drinking water system, the Public Service Board and staff will have to lock in contract terms, verify technical guarantees, and navigate any regulatory reviews tied to a privately run treatment facility.
For now, the vote puts El Paso on a test track toward wringing more supply out of the water it already handles. The concept is simple enough, but the accounting, permits, and price tag will decide whether this becomes a long-term win for ratepayers or a narrow, high-cost niche source. We have asked El Paso Water for additional details and will update this story as officials release timelines or cost estimates.
